


Family Problems

by Beth Harker (Beth_Harker)



Category: Newsies (1992)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-27
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-28 13:26:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17183852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Harker/pseuds/Beth%20Harker
Summary: Les makes a few big mistakes, and drags Jack into some Jacobs family drama.





	Family Problems

“Jack?” 

Jack kept his eyes squeezed shut, rolling onto his side.

“Jack?” The voice repeated. Jack groped around for his pillow to try and block out the sound, but he couldn’t find it.

“Jack? Jack?! Jaaaaaaaaaack? JACK JACK Jack Jack JackJackJackJACKJAAAAACK??!?” 

Funny. Jack didn’t usually dream about Les Jacobs, but even though he was fast asleep, he could hear Les’s voice as clearly as if he was standing right next to him. It took several more shouts of his name, and a series of taps on the shoulders that quickly turned into shoves, to rouse Jack from his slumber. Jack flopped over to face the source of the noise, and blinked blearily until his eyes adjusted to the darkness around him. Les was sitting on the bunk beside Jack, with his feet dangling over the edge. Jack rubbed his eyes. 

A few of the other guys had been woken by Les’s calls and were staring at him and Jack now, but seemed determined to roll over and forget about it, since it was pretty clear who Les wanted to see. 

“Hey,” Jack said, partially into his pillow. “What is it, kid?” 

Les chewed on his lip, and looked down at his hands, fiddling with the edges of a brown potato sack that he’d carried up into the bed with them. 

“You wanna run away to Santa Fe with me?” Les asked after too much time had passed. Jack sat up, the oddness of the question, the smallness of Les’s voice and the way it shook just a little bit jolting him into something like wakefulness. 

“Sounds fun,” Jack said warily. He tried to ruffle Les’s hair, but he ducked away. “Wanna tell me why we’re runnin’?” Jack asked.

Les pointed to the door of the lodging house. Apparently he wanted this to be a private conference. It cold as hell outside, but Les looked all tiny and sad and what was that word? Stricken. He looked stricken. That didn’t leave Jack with much choice but to follow him.

“Everybody in New York hates me,” Les burst out, the second the door was closed behind them. His fists were balled up at his sides, and his face was full of an intense sort of conviction that reminded Jack of David. 

“Dangerous business, hating you. I guess anybody who does it’ll have me and the other guys to answer to. ‘Sides, I don’t know anybody who hates you.” Jack put his hand of Les’s shoulder, pulling him away from the lodge. The kid looked like he needed a walk.

“But everybody does hate me. They do!” Les insisted.

“Do not.”

“Do too.”

“Oh yeah? Well, I don’t hate you, so that’s a start.” Jack gave Les a friendly sort of shove, but the younger boy didn’t so much as smile. 

“That’s why we’ve gotta run away to Santa Fe,” Les said, as if that were self-evident. 

“Guessin’ that bag’s full of money, right?” Jack asked. Les’s bow furrowed. 

“It’s full of rope,” Les said. 

“Rope? That was pretty smart of you. We’re gonna need lots of that, if we’re gonna lasso ourselves a couple of horses to ride.”

Les brightened for the first time that evening, “Yeah! And we can catch cows too, and turn them into steaks.” 

“Been a while since I had a good steak,” Jack said. He’d never had a steak of any sort, actually. “I really long while,” Jack amended. “Can’t even remember the last time I ate the stuff.”

Les nodded vigorously, “I haven’t tried steak either, but I bet it’s really good, ‘specially if you cook it with potatoes. You think it’ll be too sandy out in Santa Fe for us to start a potato garden?” 

“Nah, I’m practically an expert at gardening potatoes. Just ask Race.” 

“Me too,” Les agreed. “Racetrack knows all about it, ‘cause I told him.” 

“Did you remember to bring enough rope for the both of us?” 

“Yep!” Les answered. He was grinning all over his face now, and even with the strangeness of being outside with him at this time of night, just seeing Les smile made everything seem more normal to Jack. 

“That’s good. We still gotta think about money, though, ‘less you was planning on trying to use them ropes to get on the train.”

“We’re going to climb to the top of the train, and cling to it until we get to Santa Fe. That way nobody’ll see us,” Les said, just as if he thought he was delivering a foolproof plan. Jack nodded.

“Your family will miss you, you know,” Jack said. All at once Les’s expression darkened again.

“They hate me,” he said, in a small, strained voice. 

“That’s a pretty big change from… Yesterday. Yeah, yesterday. Just yesterday Dave was telling me ‘bout how smart you are, and how he’s real lucky to have you for a brother,” Jack said. It wasn’t precisely true, but he knew David well enough to guess how he felt about most things.

“David hates me,” Les said again. “He’s so ashamed of me that he can’t even stand to see me. That’s what he said.” 

Jack frowned, “He shouldn’t say stuff like that. Anyway, he don’t mean it.” 

“Yes he does!” 

“I’ll talk to him,” Jack offered. It didn’t seem like David to bully his little brother, but the thing about Dave was, when he decided to be mean, he always really went to town on it. 

Les shook his head.

“Whatever Dave said, he don’t hate you,” Jack gave Les’s shoulder a squeeze but Les kept his mouth clenched shut, and his eyes fixed in front of him.

“What if I told you I did something really really terrible?” Les asked. “Would you still like me?” 

“’Course,” Jack answered.

“But would you really? Do you promise?” 

“You about to tell me you killed someone?” Jack asked. 

“No.”

“Well, that’s good. I’d like you anyways, even if you did, but it’s a good thing you decided not to.”

Les gave a small nod, looking Jack up and down, like he was trying to decide whether or not to trust him. 

“I got caught stealing,” Les said at last, so softly that Jack had to lean in to catch his words. The guilt on Les’s face was plain. Jack, for his part, tried not to look surprised or puzzled, even though he was both. Jack knew lots of people who stole stuff… hell, he’d even done it himself from time to time, but it was hard to imagine Les or any of the Jacobses getting involved in anything like that. No wonder Les had gotten caught, probably on the first try. Les looked as guilty as if he really had killed somebody, his eyes downcast and dangerously moist. 

“Hey,” Jack said, giving Les a friendly smile and pulling him just a bit closer by the shoulders, “Lots of kids get caught their first time. If you was going to get in any trouble with the cops, it would’ve happened already.” 

Les went pale at the mention of cops, and that made Jack feel kind of guilty. At least he hadn’t triggered any waterworks in the kid… that was the last thing he wanted to do. 

“It wasn’t the first time,” Les said. “I stole… lots of stuff. It’s really bad.” 

“You stole a lot of stuff?” Jack clarified, and then wished that he hadn’t, from how flushed and miserable Les looked. His mind was racing with questions, though, most of all why. To Jack’s knowledge, the Jacobs family had everything they needed, but they were also proud, and it would be just like David to try and hide it from him if something had gone wrong.

“Don’t worry about it,” Jack said. “You alright? Are you getting enough to eat?” 

Les nodded. 

“How ‘bout your folks?” Jack pressed. “David?” 

Another nod. 

“Right,” Jack said, at least slightly relieved. “So, what’d you take?”

Les just shook his head, and Jack bit back a sigh. He was pretty sure it wouldn’t be anything that awful. More likely than not Les had just… accidentally picked up another kid’s coat at school or something, and David had blown it out of proportion until Les got it into his mind that he was a fugitive.

Unsure of what else to say, Jack kept his hands on Les’s shoulder, and the two of them continued to walk for a while. 

“What do you say you tell me exactly what’s going on,” Jack prompted. “Then I’ll talk to Dave and the others for you, let them know you’re sorry and you didn’t mean nothin’ by it.”

Les nodded vigorously. “It really was an accident,” he said, just as Jack had expected he would. “But David doesn’t believe me, no matter what I say. They’re all mad at me. I think Mama and Papa and Sarah might forgive me but…” 

“Wouldn’t be surprised if Dave’s already forgiven you,” Jack said, looking up the sky. It wasn’t that long until morning, and if anybody woke up and noticed Les wasn’t at home, probably they’d be a lot more worried about him than they were angry. “Speaking of which, let’s go towards your place while we talk.”

“But…”

“I’ll wake Dave up and talk to him right off. Look, I’ll stick around till everything else’s blown over, alright?” 

“But don’t you have to work?” 

Jack shrugged. He did have to work, but he wasn’t about to abandon Les either. “I’ll get around to it. What’d you steal, and why?” 

Les looked at Jack one last time, and then back at the street. It was a good thing that he took a deep breath before beginning, because the list was almost ten minutes long, and Les rattled off the items on it in rapid succession, never even pausing for a second. It was little stuff, mostly. Pencils, pieces of blank paper, food that the other kids at school were just going to throw to anyway, escalating to untouched sandwiches and apples from their lunch boxes. He’d taken some woodchips off a building, hidden a pape or two that he’d been meant to sell, and once even taken three rolls from the baker. A penny that Les had found on the ground made the list, even though Jack wouldn’t count that as stealing, along with three pennies and a brass watch that he’d gotten out of a man’s pocket.

“And worst of all,” Les finished, “There was a lead soldier on a horse.” Les ventured another glance up at Jack, clearly awaiting judgment. Jack let out a low whistle. 

“That’s more than I was expecting,” he admitted. He believed Les, though. Nobody was going to look that guilty about a crime they didn’t commit. 

“I didn’t mean to steal the things,” Les said, licking his lips. “I know… David says they didn’t just… just jump into my hands, and I know they didn’t, but I didn’t mean to steal them.”

Jack didn’t know how a person could go about snatching up that much stuff by accident, but he did know that Les didn’t look like he was lying. 

“Right,” Jack agreed. “Sometimes we do stuff by mistake.”

Another nod from Les. 

“What about the soldier?” Jack asked, figuring he’d need to know the whole story, since at this point he was pretty thoroughly involved. 

“Igotitoffofdenton’smantelpiece,” Les muttered, barely above a whisper. Jack had to get him to repeat himself twice before he could even figure out what he was saying, but when he did, his eyes widened and he had to bite back a word that Les probably shouldn’t hear, even if he was already a master criminal at the age of nine. 

“Huh,” Jack said instead. “I can see how that’s a problem.”

“I gave it back earlier today.” 

“What’d he say?” 

“’Thank you for keeping it safe for me’, but he didn’t mean it. Then he wanted to talk to David alone, but Dave said he couldn’t trust me anywhere in the house without supervision… and that Sarah wasn’t good enough at supervising me.” 

Jack gave Les a noncommittal nod, making a note to remember that Sarah and David were probably mad at each other too. They were approaching the Jacobs house now, the window and fire escape in clear view even in the darkness. Jack was glad to see that the lights weren’t on inside. That meant the hopefully nobody had even noticed that Les was gone. 

“David’s never going to forgive me,” Les said, for about the thousandth time that night. “Ever.” 

“I don’t know ‘bout that,” Jack tried to reassure. “I’ve stolen plenty of stuff, and gotten in more trouble for it than you have, and Dave and me is still pals, ain’t we?” 

“That’s different.” 

“Only one way to find out,” Jack said, pulling Les towards the fire-escape.


End file.
